


Eclipse of the Mind

by TheDarkFlygon



Series: Fly's AreOri [1]
Category: Inazuma Eleven, Inazuma Eleven: Orion no Kokuin
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Angst and Feels, Canon Rewrite, Experimental Style, Gen, Gender Confusion, Hopeful Ending, Identity Issues, Internal Conflict, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:34:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28484694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDarkFlygon/pseuds/TheDarkFlygon
Summary: Ichihoshi Mitsuru faces an internal debate on alignments, a meteor shower and a shattered mask.
Relationships: Ichihoshi Hikaru & Ichihoshi Mitsuru
Series: Fly's AreOri [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2086488
Kudos: 4





	Eclipse of the Mind

**Author's Note:**

> A couple days ago, I came up with some ideas of how I'd be rewriting AreOri if I had the courage to write such a fic. One of these edits I wanted to make was to Ichihoshi's backstory because, as much as I love this character, I know my personal conception has biased me and that his backstory is just a Mixi-Max of the Fubukis' and Tsurugis'.  
> What I came up with instead is... weird. Sure, Mitsuru isn't technically McDed in this rewrite, but you'll see the's been a couple major changes. That is, if you can understand my writing because even I find it confusing. The POV made it confusing, I guess.
> 
> Also, I have no experience with DID. I've reseached into it to some extent, but really haven't enough to even attempt writing it as such, thus why I'm not tagging it on this fic. I don't wat to misrepresent DID and just based myself on the canon episodes of the series to write this, so please don't treat this story as an accurate depiction or even an attempt at it. I simply don't feel comfortable talking about a condition I don't have.  
> This story is more about gender dysphoria than anything, albeit in a very confusing form. Beware depictions of internalized misgendering, accidental deadnaming and just potentially triggering content in general. Reader discretion is advised on this one.

She’s not a good person.

She used to be, when they were children – Mitsuru and Hiyoko, the fusional Stardust Sisters who sparkled in the eyes of the audience of the matches the elder sister would dispute while the younger one gave her advice through sign language – but that’s a long, long time ago.

Since then, Dad has died, Hiyoko had to get hospitalized in an unknown location for operations whose scale she can’t remember and Mitsuru went to Russia to forget about it all and become a professional soccer player, the one thing she was good for.

She’s not a good person, but that goddamn sunshine boy from who-knows-where is determined to tell her she is. Something about her plays showing him she’s actually a good guy now! She’s part of the team, she’s their friend! Endou has told her, staring right into her eyes, that she was on the team and that if she needed help she could rely on them!

(Don’t make her laugh. She’s tried to kill the entire team in a bus crash. She’s tried to get Kidou expelled out of the team. She’s tried to get Endou arrested. She’s been tasked to kill Nosaka because he’s too inconvenient for Orion. She’s never been the great person trapped in a mortal trap they’re talking about. He doesn’t know who they’re even talking to.)

She ends up shielding Nosaka from the hit he’s about to take to the head.

No, she doesn’t know what she’s doing either. She’s nothing more than Orion’s mole in the Japanese team because their coach is an inconvenience, their two playmakers scheming together are an inconvenience, their sun-bright brave boys are an inconvenience – everyone is an inconvenience and so is she.

(They remind her of Hiyoko, her bright smile when she’d talk about soccer and analyse the teams she was about to fight. Remind her of the times where she’d spend nights going through every player’s profile and moves as to come up with the best ways to counter them. Remind her of Mitsuru’s bright smile and affective pats on the shoulder when she’d tell her.)

_You’ve chosen,_ Nosaka tells her as she’s lying on the ground. _You’ve made the choice to face your real self._

Nosaka doesn’t know who he’s talking to. He’s never known, no matter how confident he’s looking about it. He can’t know the one who’s buried under the mantle of Ichihoshi Mitsuru.

(What mantle? She isn’t a disguise.)

_You’ve been hiding all kinds of feelings, but you can’t keep hiding everything that you feel forever._

Who is this for? She doesn’t need the advice. (He must hide from the world; he’s scared of being himself). She isn’t hiding anything… is she?

He takes his hand and gets back to his feet. (He?)

_Be honest with your true heart._

She can’t deny it: she wants to play the soccer Mitsuru and she played back then (wait, isn’t _she_ Mitsuru?), like the Stardust Sisters who shone bright inside and outside the field, flowing like the wind with dreams brighter than the full moon on a clear night. After all, Hiyoko wouldn’t want to play the dirty, malevolent soccer she’s been using all this time to accomplish the missions asked of her by the men in the dark.

(She’s still not a good person, since her heart is already corroded, but she may as well try for her sister’s sake).

_You traitor, you traitor, you traitor._

A meteor appears in the cloudy, ashy sky, right above her head. She runs for her life, skin crawling, slaloming between crash sites and flames –

_Mitsuru, Mitsuru…_

His – _her_ – his – _her_ voice calls to her, scared for dear life too, scared of being crushed by the meteorites like they almost died in the car crash all those years ago. He’s taking control again, just because his willpower to live is stronger than her desire to get out of there alive—

_You’ve had your chance. Your final decision was the wrong one._

She takes control back, sister instincts kicking in as smoke chokes her, _Hikaru, I’ll protect you!_

Wait, shouldn’t it be Hiyoko?

_Mitsuru, forget about me!_

Who…? Who are they…?

_Mitsuru, you don’t have to worry about me anymore._

They’re crying.

They fall to their knees, head pounding, mind splitting, on the trajectory of the biggest meteor yet.

Teammates are calling to _her_ , screaming _her_ name as to call _her_ back from the trance – but their eyes are staring at the meteor incoming, smoke surrounding them as their body refuses to move, survival instincts down and souls in shards, unable to process anything but the question. Who’s who? There _isn’t_ an answer to that question anymore.

Two of the team members get them out of the field while their thoughts are busy twirling around. If they’re not Mitsuru… Who are they? What are they doing and why? Why did they dirty their hands? Are they the monster they’re describing, the one who’s kept attacking their own teammates? What do they want?

Mitsuru isn’t a bad person, or at least, she wants to believe she isn’t… or wasn’t, at least. Maybe she is the person her supposed teammates think she is, the one who can rely on others and the one who wants to be true to herself and play the way she would with Hiy ** _iiiiiiiii_** – _Hikaru_ – back then, back when everything was okay and they were free

_All I wanted to do was to play soccer with Hikaru again._

_Her_ voice sounds feeble.

_I even went as far as hurting others… But Hiyoko is… Hikaru is…_

The team is trying to reel her back in. Nosaka tells her she didn’t hurt anyone, because any injury she could’ve inflicted during the match was an acting gig and there was actually nothing wrong with his health. Inamori is going on again about that “your plays say you’re a good person” spiel he’s tried to serve her before. Kira wants to use his father’s money to save her long-lost sibling (wait, does the team not know either what gender said sibling is?).

Oh God. They actually want to help her and he doesn’t know how to deal with that.

The coach and Kidou then go on about some investigation they’ve lead while the latter was suspended, revealing there was actually no sibling in the hospital. Something breaks inside her mind – their mind? – because she can’t process it. Can’t process the fact her sibling is actually gone. Can’t process the fact all of what she did, all the pain she has caused, has been for nothing and that, at long last, Hikaru is lost.

_Hikaru?_

They crash to the ground, head splitting in two. A blackout, a shuddered breath.

_Mitsuru…? I’m… I’m… scared, Mitsuru… Where am I? What are these people talking about?_

Blackout.

_Hikaru, it’s okay! I’m here for you –_

Who’s _Hikaru_?

They don’t follow what the others are saying – something about being hospitalized herself, something about split personalities – their head hurts. Their beloved sibling died during the fateful accident? Their head is splitting apart, unable to deal with any of this. Something about the letters Hikaru sent (her sibling – her beloved sibling – is he fake?).

They’ve got no idea of what’s going on – _Sister, Sister, I’m scared… I’m scared!_ – _It’s okay Hikaru, I’ll protect you…_ – the miasma of confusion and darkness never abandons, never leaves them. It’s hard to breathe, hard to speak. They’re broken, broken from the weight of their actions, broken from the weight of implications, broken from trying to reform and never managing to – they’re too many inside a cramped space.

They’re put on the field anyway.

They run anyway, for some reason, maybe to escape from the smothering void they’re currently lingering in. They’re barely aware of their surroundings – just aware enough to be playing soccer at some extent, aware enough to see teammates cover for them – but not enough to be an effective player. They let Endou’s pass go to waste.

Their brain is swamped with the questions they can’t answer, feet trapped in a sea of mud and debris, working at half the pace it’s supposed to because they can’t process much.

 _Go for it, Ichihoshi!_ , yells one voice. _Run, Ichihoshi!_ , screams another in an enthusiastic tone.

They get help from the unlikeliest of sources on the Japanese side; namely, Haizaki, who was (justifiably) trying to take them down earlier. They hear again the words that Endou told them on that one evening, the ones about belonging on the team, about having them as friends. They remember Asuto giving them his hand to rise them back to their feet, him taking a hit for them, congratulating them on almost scoring.

They’re tired, but they remember a young voice yelling from the audience during a heated match – _Go, Sis!_

They’re broken, but they remember a peaceful conversation next to a river – _you really have a good eye for soccer, but I lack stamina_ – the reliant older sister and the younger, meeker sibling – _the two of us are one, we’re a team of two_. They’ll take the world on together.

They’re suddenly in the golden mindscape she hasn’t dared to enter, back to their juvenile states, the ones they were in when the accident happened and their lives got stolen.

 _It’s enough_. _You’ve done enough, Mitsuru,_ the younger child says with a saddened smile. _I’m sorry, it’s my fault you’ve gone through so much pain; but it’s enough now. You don’t need to try so hard for me anymore._

One tries to tell the other, _it’s not your fault_. It’s never been. Because they were together, because of their help, they’ve gone this far. They wanted to play soccer with the other again.

_I wanted to keep believing you and I were the same… but we’re not. We’ve never been the Stardust Sisters._

But they know it’s wrong. They know this “Mitsuru” has always been just a façade.

_I wanted to believe I was the girl everyone wanted me to be, Mitsuru._

But they know why they did that and how wrong it’s been for the both of them.

_I’m sorry that I’ve used you as a façade, Mitsuru._

But they know it’s been nothing but false truths. They know these people weren’t aware. Thye know how much they’ve repressed everything behind this travesty, just how much they disguised their identity away, even to themselves.

_I’ll get to you, someday, Mitsuru – we’re forever a team._

The golden mindscape fades away, bringing Ichihoshi back to the pitch.

One of Saudi Arabia’s forwards charges on, attempting to steal the ball in the opposing player’s feet. Teammates are trying to tell their fellow member to beware the oncoming attack.

The forward gets cancelled out with a somersault.

Nosaka, smirking, approaches the player in question.

“We finally meet… Ichihoshi Hikaru.”

And Hikaru smiles back, at once feeling whole.


End file.
